Alabama takes the rematch ... and the title

NEW ORLEANS – With distinctively bland uniforms, a defense loaded with stalwarts and an offense predicated on smash-mouth football, Alabama remains one of the quintessentially old-school programs in college football.

In the Bowl Championship Series title game, the No. 2 Crimson Tide showed in their 21-0 victory over No. 1 Louisiana State on Monday night that there is still a place in the national elite for a throwback program in which ingenuity comes in the form of a play-action pass. In Alabama, which claimed its 14th national title in the first shutout in BCS title-game history, nobody needs to be reminded that football wins are not graded with style points and that touchdowns can be overrated.

The ballyhooed rematch, following an earlier loss to LSU, was a mismatch, as Alabama's defense mauled the Tigers and held them to 92 total yards.

It was not pretty, or particularly engaging, but Alabama's suffocating defense, an effective performance by quarterback A.J. McCarron and five field goals by Jeremy Shelley helped the Crimson Tide (12-1) win their second national championship in three years. Nick Saban became the first coach in the BCS era to win three national titles; he also won one while coaching LSU in 2003.

“I think it was a great team win,” Saban said. “Our defense did a great job, and our offense controlled momentum and tempo of this game from start to finish.”

The Alabama victory also gave the state its third consecutive national title – Auburn won last year – and the sixth straight national title for a team from the Southeastern Conference.

The Louisiana State star defensive back and returner Tyrann Mathieu remained defiant to the end, saying: “We won our division. We won our conference. We're still champions.”

National champions? he was asked.

“I didn't say that,” Mathieu said.

Alabama held LSU (13-1) to one first down and 43 total yards in the first half. LSU put forth an impressive and unimaginative game plan, as they did not take any shots down the field or appear to make significant adjustments. Instead, the Tigers kept running the ball into a sea wall of Alabama defenders and stuck with the senior quarterback Jordan Jefferson. He fumbled two snaps, averaged just 4.8 yards a completion and was never comfortable running the ball.

“We stopped the option all night,” Alabama linebacker Courtney Upshaw said. “That was a big key to the game.”

Jefferson finished 11 of 17 passing, but LSU never found any rhythm, space or momentum. He said the Alabama defense mostly played its safeties deep, making it difficult to throw downfield.

“It feels like a nightmare,” Jefferson said.

LSU won these teams' first meeting in overtime, 9-6, because of stellar secondary play, elite special teams and an offense that did just enough. This time, the Alabama special teams carried the night, with Shelley's five field goals tying a record for all bowl games. Punter Cody Mandell kept the ball away from Mathieu, Shelley hit five of seven field-goal attempts, and a 49-yard punt return midway through the first quarter by Marquis Maze allowed Alabama to corral the game's momentum. Maze, Alabama's best receiver, left the game with a hamstring injury after that and did not return.

On offense, Trent Richardson backed McCarron, rushing for 96 yards and adding the exclamation point with a 34-yard touchdown run with 4:36 to play. But McCarron was the offensive hero, as Saban said the key to the game plan was having him throw more on first down, which kept LSU from stacking the box with eight defenders.

But it was Alabama's smothering defense that provided the night's indelible performance. LSU looked as if it were running in quicksand, with Jefferson looking helpless on option plays and lost in the passing game.

His offensive ineptitude was best summarized by one play in the third quarter in which, under pressure, he flipped a shovel pass that Alabama's C.J. Mosley intercepted.

“In a way, you could sense the frustration,” Alabama's Upshaw said. “They were down.”

Jefferson tackled Mosley so hard that it resulted in Mosley's leaving the game with a gruesome left leg injury. Jefferson was not the only one frustrated. LSU fans booed him and chanted for the backup Jarrett Lee, who began the season as LSU's starter before being benched during the first game against Alabama.

Lee never came into the game, though, which will lead to a long season of second guessing in Baton Rouge. That started when Bobby Hebert, the father of LSU's starting center and a local radio host, launched into a press conference rant about why Coach Les Miles didn't switch quarterbacks or take more shots down the field.

“We did consider Jarrett Lee,” Miles answered diplomatically. “But we felt like, with the pass rush, that we were getting that we needed a guy that could move the seat and not sustain the rush.”

McCarron orchestrated the Alabama game plan brilliantly. He had thrown a critical interception against LSU, and his best statistic Monday night was that he and Alabama did not turn the ball over. Still, he was far from a caretaker, finishing 23 of 34 for 234 yards. While he never found the end zone, McCarron threw aggressively downfield and often at Mathieu, whom Alabama clearly picked on at times.

“They didn't give our playmakers on defense a chance at the ball,” Mathieu said. “When he did put the ball in the air, it was a great ball.”

LSU could not find a spark on offense. The Tigers, one of the country's dominant rushing teams, averaged 1.4 yards a carry. Alabama's smothering front seven reduced the talented tailbacks Kenny Hilliard, Michael Ford and Spencer Ware to 23 yards on 12 carries.

“I've got to say, we out-physicaled them today,” Upshaw said.

Alabama came up with a pair of surprise stars. Receiver Kevin Norwood, who entered the game with seven catches on the season, caught four passes for 78 yards. Tight end Brad Smelley finished with seven catches for 39 yards and was clearly a factor in the Alabama game plan to counter LSU's defensive speed.

In the teams' first meeting, on Nov. 5, neither team reached the end zone. Alabama was haunted by four missed field goals, three of them by the Tide's long-kicking specialist, Cade Foster. But his only role Monday came as a decoy on a fake punt.

Alabama came out aggressive early, with McCarron living up to his promise to play with more fire and emotion. His sweetest throw ended sourly for the Crimson Tide, when Smelley dropped a pretty lob pass in the second quarter that almost surely would have resulted in a touchdown after he slipped behind LSU linebacker Ryan Baker.

Instead, it slipped between his hands and Alabama settled for a 42-yard field-goal attempt after a deft fake field-goal attempt kept the drive alive.

But with the ball at the LSU 25, Saban elected to go with his short-kicking specialist, Shelley, on the cusp of his range, and Michael Brockers blocked the kick.

That gave LSU fans flashbacks of the first meeting. The lack of touchdowns certainly looked familiar. But this time around, LSU's offense never got moving, and that kicked off a celebration of Tide fans from Bourbon Street to Tuscaloosa.

Ever persnickety, Saban said he'd be able to find a few things wrong with the shutout.

“I have a good, bad and an ugly reel,” Saban said about Alabama's film study. “I can always find something ugly.”

He'll have to look long and hard. In Tuscaloosa, seasons are graded by whether the Tide win the national title. This season and its remarkably lopsided final game will be remembered as a work of art.

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